A genetic mutation in mammals 10 million years ago greatly enhanced their ability to break down alcohol in the food they ate. That’s the finding of researcher Matthew Carrigan at […]
Category: posts
All of the World’s Yeast Probably Originated in China
The yeasts that ferment beer, bread, and wine all over the world appear to have originated in China. The same is true for yeast found in sewage, termite mounds, infected […]
Ötzi the Iceman’s last meal 5,300 years ago
Twenty years after his frozen body was discovered in an Alpine glacier on the Austrian-Italian border, researchers found Ötzi’s stomach full of food tucked under his ribs. In the hour […]
Mississippi convicts pardoned for eating diet suspected of causing pellagra
Pellagra, a disease caused by a lack of vitamin B-3 (niacin) in the diet, became epidemic among the poor in the southern United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. […]
Toxic amounts of Vitamin A in Polar Bear Liver
It has long been known among Eskimos and arctic travelers that eating polar bear liver can cause severe illness in men and dogs. Nearly 80 years, a researcher Norway named Kåre […]
Pathogen that caused Irish potato famine probably came from South America
Phytophthora infestans, the fungus responsible for the Irish potato famine of 1846 that killed an estimated one million people, probably originated in South America. That’s the conclusion researchers from North Carolina […]
History of School Lunch programs in the United States
Philadelphia and Boston were the first major cities to actively attempt to implement a school lunch program in the United States. Philadelphia began by serving penny lunches at one school […]
Cause of “milk sickness” that killed Abraham Lincoln’s mother
In the fall of 1818, 34 year-old Nancy Hanks Lincoln, mother of 11 year-old Sarah and 9 year-old Abraham, died unexpectedly from “milk sickness,” a mysterious disease afflicting pioneers in […]
How About a Vitamin D-Enriched Beer?
In 1936, capitalizing on the demand for vitamin-fortified foods, the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, introduced a vitamin D-fortified canned beer. Evidently it wasn’t popular, since Schlitz discontinued […]
Busted! Sent to federal prison for coloring margarine
Joseph Wirth (above), his brother Toney Wirth, and Patrick Raidy were each fined $5,000 and sentenced to five-year terms in Fort Leavenworth prison in Kansas in 1911 for coloring margarine […]